Prep baseball: Boone rallies to beat conference rival Ballard

After stringing together seven-straight victories over the past couple of weeks, the Boone baseball team scuffled toward the end last week, falling in two straight contests.

A Friday matchup against Ballard gave the Toreadors one last chance to head into the final weekend of the regular season with some momentum. And it proved to be just what they needed.

Boone overcame an early 2-0 deficit to defeat Raccoon River Conference rival Ballard 6-2 at Memorial Field, ending its modest two-game losing skid. The victory also locked the Toreadors in for second in the conference, behind Carlisle.

“We didn’t want to [lose three in a row] going into the weekend here,” Boone coach Charlie Eastlund said. “It was really important for us to come out here and play well and to get the win, too.”

Boone starter Spencer Turner went five innings, allowing two hits and two runs — both unearned. But he was hampered by spotty control, giving six free passes. He left the game after 106 pitches and earned the victory, boosting his record to 3-0 on the season.

“Spencer wasn’t throwing his best. He’d be the first guy to tell you that,” Eastlund said. “But the thing he did well for us… he continued to compete.”

Boone’s offense struggled to find its stroke out of the gate. In the first three innings, the Toreadors only registered two hits and put four runners on base.

Runs seemed like they were going to be hard to come by from the outset, as Ballard mustered across two runs in the first four frames on just two hits. While Turner kept the hits to a minimum, he walked five batters across the same four-inning span.

But when Boone’s offense came alive, the tallies came in bunches.

The Toreadors scored six runs between the fourth and fifth innings to take a lead it wouldn’t relinquish.

Jayton Hull got things started for Boone in the fourth inning, reaching base via an error by the opposing shortstop. Tanner Frost followed with a walk. The next two batters grounded out and struck out, setting the stage for sophomore Derek Rhinehart.

He came through.

Rhinehart laced a double into the left-center gap, scoring both runners and tying the game at two.

“I had runners on base, so I was just trying to put a ball in play,” Rhinehart said. “I was thankful enough that I was able to hit a gapper out there and move the runners in.”

In the fifth inning, the Toreadors put their first four batters on base. The team got another big hit, but this time it came from junior Jackson Smith, who singled in two runs. When all was said and done, Boone pushed across four more runs to give it a 6-2 lead.

Evan Appenzeller came on in relief and threw two innings of one-hit ball to close out the game.

“We met after the top of the fourth inning, we were down 2-0, it felt like more for some reason,” Eastlund said. “I just wanted to tell them that we’ve only given up one run in two innings. It’s not that big of a deficit. I told them to put some runners on and quit popping the ball up… the hitters did a good job making adjustments.”

Boone improved to 19-9 on the season with Monday’s 14-8 win at Norwalk.

The Toreadors learned their postseason fate late this week. They will head to Perrynext Friday to play in the first round of districts. But the fact that Boone isn’t hosting ruffled some feathers among the squad.

“It was nice to host for a number of years… but we’re not, so we’ll go on the road and do our best to play good baseball,” Eastlund said. “We can’t overlook Perry. They have some very talented players.”

Either way, the Toreadors have beat Perry twice already this season — 14-4 and 9-0 — so that will undoubtedly be on the team’s mind.

“We should be playing at home, but it’s whatever,” Rhinehart said. “We’ll go beat them anyway.”